In this large-scale contribution, we deal with the relationship between properties of cited references of Web of Science articles and the field normalized citation rate of these articles. Using nearly 1 million articles, and three classification systems with different levels of granularity, we study the effects of number of cited references, share of references covered by Web of Science, mean age of references and mean citation rate of references on field normalized citation rate. To expose the relationship between the predictor variables and the response variable, we use quantile regression. We found that a higher number of references, a higher share of references to publications within Web of Science and references to more recent publications correlate with citation impact. A correlation was observed even when normalization was done with a finely grained classification system. The predictor variables affected citation impact to a larger extent at higher quantile levels. Regarding the relative importance of the predictor variables, citation impact of the cited references was in general the least important variable. Number of cited references carried most of the importance for both low and medium quantile levels, but this importance was lessened at the highest considered level.

Scientists collaborate increasingly on a global scale. Does this trend also hold for other bibliometric relations such as direct citations, cocitations and shared references? This study examines citation-based relations in publications published in the journal Scientometrics from 1981 to 2010. Different measures of Mean Geographical Distance (MGD) are tested. If we take all citation links into consideration, there is no indication of MGD increase, but when we look at maximum distances of each relation, a weak tendency of increasing MGD could be observed. One major factor behind the lack of growth of mean distances is the form of the distribution of citation links over distances. Our data suggest that the interactions might grow simultaneously for both short and long distances.

Writing center tutors and librarians share in the goal of helping students with the recursive processes of writing and researching. Nevertheless, few writing centers that are located in university libraries work collaboratively, but rather simply share a location.

Research from the US shows that collaboration can take different forms, and while some of these may be readily transferable to European university systems, some will be challenging to implement. Also, this research tends to originate from librarians rather than writing consultants (Ferer, 2012).

Umea University is unusual in that it works collaboratively. Drawing on our experience, we will provide a Swedish university's perspective based on the collaboration between its Writing Centre and University Library. We explain how we work together to match students' writing and researching needs, the challenges in collaborating, and what future additional collaborations are possible. Finally, we raise the question, what more can we do to develop and maintain our collaboration?

Discussing best practices can provide valuable information to better meet the new generation of students. Research, thinking and writing go hand in hand. Rather than compartmentalizing these processes, writing tutors and librarians can work together with students to help them navigate these intricately linked processes. Collecting this expertise into one location allows students more comprehensive support and convenient access: "one-stop shopping" (Cooke & Bledsoe, 2008).

Writing centers and libraries can have an influence in the current reformation of higher education and should contribute to the discussion by promoting their strengths and sharing their respective knowledge (Elmborg, 2005). We hope to contribute to the conversation through our presentation.

As the number of scientific journals has multiplied, journal rankings have become increasingly important for scientific decisions. From submissions and subscriptions to grants and hirings, researchers, policy makers, and funding agencies make important decisions influenced by journal rankings such as the ISI journal impact factor. Typically, the rankings are derived from the citation network between a selection of journals and unavoidably depend on this selection. However, little is known about how robust rankings are to the selection of included journals. We compare the robustness of three journal rankings based on network flows induced on citation networks. They model pathways of researchers navigating the scholarly literature, stepping between journals and remembering their previous steps to different degrees: zero-step memory as impact factor, one-step memory as Eigenfactor, and two-step memory, corresponding to zero-, first-, and second-order Markov models of citation flow between journals. We conclude that higher-order Markov models perform better and are more robust to the selection of journals. Whereas our analysis indicates that higher-order models perform better, the performance gain for higher-order Markov models comes at the cost of requiring more citation data over a longer time period.

Purpose: There is very little research about fiction writers’ information behaviours. The aim of this paper is to explore this in an empirical study. It also aims to add understanding of how novelists’ information behaviour relates to their creative writing process.Approach: The exploratory study presents findings based on qualitative data from interviews with six professional novelists.Findings: The study found that the novelists have a wide and deep information need in their creative writing, and seek a large amount of information in their research. Seeking information appears also to be an important part of their creative process. The novelists in the study, like other artistic workers, take advantage of the internet and library, museum, and archive services in their information-seeking. They also practice some largely unique methods, namely visiting environments and interviewing people. The information novelists seek are of both objective and subjective nature.Research limitations: This is a relatively new professional group to study within information behaviour research, and the small sample prevents a conclusive analysis. Further quantitative and qualitative research would enhance and confirm the findings of this paper.

The focus of the project Sök på golvet (Search, Feel, Find) was to create a prototype for an alternative search tool for the interactive floor surface. Another goal was to investigate how a non-text-based interface could be designed for other electronic media. Target groups for the study were primarily distance students and researchers, two groups that visit the physical library relatively rarely. The project was a collaboration between Umeå University Library, Institute of Design (Umeå University), Kulturverket (Umeå municipality), HUMlab (Umeå University), Lövånger school and library (Skellefteå municipality). Implementation of the project was made possible by funds from the National Library of Sweden. The empirical basis for the project’s results were based on results from the workshops, interviews and user surveys. The work method was tentative and was characterized by flexibility. The results of the project indicate the need for the library to develop an interactive interface for the search service that is characterized by a clear and minimal design and follows the library’s visual identity. The visual inspiration is equally important as the scientific content. To create a more seamless user experience the library’s physical and digital environments should be linked together. The result of the work with the children points towards a non-linear, more intuitive information search in which several senses are employed in the process.

The ICT industry and services are on the verge of substituting quality of service and utility functions; with quality of experience, QoE. While intuitive, QoE, has eluded the research community. QoE takes into account what the user is experiencing with new products and services. Once this information is collected, it becomes an input in the development of the new product or new service. But how does one measure directly quality of experience? In this conceptual paper, I discuss from an ICT perspective, the utility function and quality of service, QoS. I also present how active interested the industry is in QoE. I concluded with some key points that may serve as a guideline in the process of constructing the QoE function.

A similarity-oriented approach for deriving reference values used in citation normalization is explored and contrasted with the dominant approach of utilizing database-defined journal sets as a basis for deriving such values. In the similarity-oriented approach, an assessed article's raw citation count is compared with a reference value that is derived from a reference set, which is constructed in such a way that articles in this set are estimated to address a subject matter similar to that of the assessed article. This estimation is based on second-order similarity and utilizes a combination of 2 feature sets: bibliographic references and technical terminology. The contribution of an article in a given reference set to the reference value is dependent on its degree of similarity to the assessed article. It is shown that reference values calculated by the similarity-oriented approach are considerably better at predicting the assessed articles' citation count compared to the reference values given by the journal-set approach, thus significantly reducing the variability in the observed citation distribution that stems from the variability in the articles' addressed subject matter.

The purpose of this thesis is to contribute to the methodology at the intersection of relational and evaluative bibliometrics. Experimental investigations are presented that address the question of how we can most successfully produce estimates of the subject similarity between documents. The results from these investigations are then explored in the context of citation-based research evaluations in an effort to enhance existing citation normalization methods that are used to enable comparisons of subject-disparate documents with respect to their relative impact or perceived utility. This thesis also suggests and explores an approach for revealing the uncertainty and stability (or lack thereof) coupled with different kinds of citation indicators.This suggestion is motivated by the specific nature of the bibliographic data and the data collection process utilized in citation-based evaluation studies.

The results of these investigations suggest that similarity-detection methods that take a global view of the problem of identifying similar documents are more successful in solving the problem than conventional methods that are more local in scope. These results are important for all applications that require subject similarity estimates between documents. Here these insights are specifically adopted in an effort to create a novel citation normalization approach that – compared to current best practice – is more in tune with the idea of controlling for subject matter when thematically different documents are assessed with respect to impact or perceived utility. The normalization approach is flexible with respect to the size of the normalization baseline and enables a fuzzy partition of the scientific literature. It is shown that this approach is more successful than currently applied normalization approaches in reducing the variability in the observed citation distribution that stems from the variability in the articles’ addressed subject matter. In addition, the suggested approach can enhance the interpretability of normalized citation counts. Finally, the proposed method for assessing the stability of citation indicators stresses that small alterations that could be artifacts from the data collection and preparation steps can have a significant influence on the picture that is painted by the citationindicator. Therefore, providing stability intervals around derived indicators prevents unfounded conclusions that otherwise could have unwanted policy implications.

Together, the new normalization approach and the method for assessing the stability of citation indicators have the potential to enable fairer bibliometric evaluative exercises and more cautious interpretations of citation indicators.

In this paper, we compare two sophisticated publication-level approaches to ex-post citation normalization: an item-oriented approach and an approach falling under the general algorithmically constructed classification system approach. Using articles published in core journals in Web of Science (SCIE, SSCI & A&HCI) during 2009 (n=955,639), we first examine, using the measure Proportion explained variation (PEV), to what extent the publication-level approaches can explain and correct for variation in the citation distribution that stems from subject matter heterogeneity. We then, for the subset of articles from life science and biomedicine (n=456,045), gauge the fairness of the normalization approaches with respect to their ability to identify highly cited articles when subject area is factored out. This is done by utilizing information from publication-level MeSH classifications to create high quality subject matter baselines and by using the measure Deviations from expectations (DE). The results show that the item-oriented approach had the best performance regarding PEV. For DE, only the most fine-grained clustering solution could compete with the item-oriented approach. However, the item-oriented approach performed better when cited references were heavily weighted in the similarity calculations.

In this paper we study the effects of field normalization baseline on relative performance of 20 natural science departments in terms of citation impact. Impact is studied under three baselines: journal, ISI/Thomson Reuters subject category, and Essential Science Indicators field. For the measurement of citation impact, the indicators item-oriented mean normalized citation rate and Top-5% are employed. The results, which we analyze with respect to stability, show that the choice of normalization baseline matters. We observe that normalization against publishing journal is particular. The rankings of the departments obtained when journal is used as baseline, irrespective of indicator, differ considerably from the rankings obtained when ISI/Thomson Reuters subject category or Essential Science Indicators field is used. Since no substantial differences are observed when the baselines Essential Science Indicators field and ISI/Thomson Reuters subject category are contrasted, one might suggest that people without access to subject category data can perform reasonable normalized citation impact studies by combining normalization against journal with normalization against Essential Science Indicators field.

In their article “A farewell to the MNCS and like size-independent indicators” Abramo and D’Angelo argue that size-independent indicators are not suitable for assessing research performance; due to productivity differences among researchers and universities the use of size-independent indicators can distort rankings. Since I previously made a similar argument, I partly agree with the authors. However, I do not believe that assessing performance in terms of efficiency is the only important task for evaluative scientometrics. An equally important task is to assess the value of scientific contributions, and evaluating research organizations’ contribution to science is not the same task as evaluating the performance of their scientists.

Based on previous studies it has been found that women have a smaller chance than men of attaining professorships. It has also been found that gender differences in career development have been observed in many different countries. This study aims to contribute to these discussions by analyzing the extent to which gender differences in career development can be explained by early career opportunities, specifically the prestigious postdoctoral fellowship which is particular to the Swedish university system. This study concluded that women and men have the same probability to achieve a postdoctoral fellowship and that among men and women who have achieved this we observed that they had equal chances of becoming professors. However, it was also shown that women are substantially worse off than men for the study group of those who have not achieved a postdoctoral fellowship. This indicates that a meritocratic system does not seem do discriminate against women whereas as vacancy system seems to do so.

This bachelor thesis explores the work among the ”V8-libraries”, with focus on the librarians that works within the collaboration to see how it’s perceived. The questions asked are: How does the communication between the libraries work? How does the leadership look like? What benefits and what challenges does the collaboration come with? For the theoretical framework, Jennifer Rowleys theory of innovation collaboration strategies for libraries has been used. The method has been qualitative interviews with three informants that works within the collaboration.

The study’s conclusion is that the V8-libraries have great communication and a leadership that serves the needs of the collaboration. The two biggest benefit is for the users of the libraries since they receive a greater range of books and other media, and also for the librarians since the collaboration makes bigger staff with bigger competence. The big challenge in the collaboration is the great distances between the libraries since the librarians wish to visit each other more often to discuss greater innovations between them.

The emergence of the business network approach2016In: Extending the business network approach: new territories, new technologies, new terms / [ed] Peter Thilenius, Cecilia Pahlberg, Virpi Havila, Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2016, p. 21-38Chapter in book (Refereed)

Abstract [en]

Relationships between commercial actors have existed for thousands of years as highlighted by Hadjikhani and LaPlaca (2013) and Hadjikhani in the final chapter of this volume. However, research on relationships between business actors, often summarised under headings such as industrial marketing or B2B, has a more recent origin. In the words of Hadjikhani and LaPlaca (2013: 294), relationship research 'existed in society but had little scientific identity or inquiry'. This is even truer for research on wider relationship systems, that is, business networks. However, as will be demonstrated in the present volume, the situation in the beginning of the twenty-first century is quite different. Research on business networks is lively and manifested by a large number of publications. A search for 'business networks' in the databases SCI-EXPANDED, SSCI and A&HCI for all years until 2015 (with the restriction that the journals publishing the papers should be classified in the Subject Category 'Business & Economics' in all 156 journals) resulted in 553 hits, with the first papers published in 1992. Publications then did not accelerate until the early twenty-first century with an all-time high in 2012 of 70 hits, and somewhat lower figures in the following years. However, it should be noted that the 2015 figures merely refer to the first part of the year (Fig. 2.1) and will increase.

The aim of this thesis is to investigate the role of class visits to public- or school-libraries during school hours, regarding students of ages 7- 10. The research is founded on a case study on Burträsk library, and uses qualitative interviews with librarians and teachers at the nearby elementary school, and non-intrusive observations of class visits. The research questions were:

- What is the function of the school's class visits to the library, for the students' reading and desire to read?

- What thoughts and attitudes do the teachers and librarians who work with class visits have, about reading-promoting activities and children's reading?

- How do these thoughts and attitudes express themselves, in the work with class visits?

The study finds that the teachers and librarians who are part of the study have a pragmatic approach to children's reading, which places more emphasis on the children’s joy to read, than that they read a particular type of literature. The teachers 'work creates a joyful view of reading in most children who participate in class visits, and class visits seem to be of great importance for the children' s desire to read.

RDA (Resource Description & Access) is a new cataloging standard that has been implemented in libraries in several countries over the world. It is based on the conceptual model FRBR (Functional Requirements for Bibliographical Records) and its rules have been influenced by archival descriptive rules. Thus RDA provides an opportunity for collaboration between archives and libraries. Umeå University Library is currently running the project RDA – An Opportunity for Archive and Library Collaboration, with support from Lund University Library, the National Library of Sweden and the National Archives. The aim of this project is to explore how RDA can be applied on archival materials and how FRBR entities can be related to aforementioned materials. RIMMF (RDA in Many Metadata Formats) is a cataloging training tool and has been used to visualize RDA and FRBR. RDA Toolkit has been used as a support tool in the cataloging process. Different models for applying RDA on archival materials have been developed in the project. The models have separate advantages and disadvantages, for example when it comes to creating searchability and to link archival materials with published materials. Using RDA brings possibilities to create linked data useful for archives, libraries and other interested parties. RDA has the potential to work as a standard for describing both archival and bibliographic materials.

In 2003 the libraries of ten municipalities in the northern part of Sweden were each given 10 000 (SEK) by the BIN-project to purchase books on demand instead of making inter-library loans. This attempt was called Köpa på efterfrågan (Purchasing on demand). The purpose of this master thesis is to evalutate Köpa på efterfrågan. The results of the evaluation show that the books purchased on demand were quite popular. Almost all the purchased books were non-fictional with most books being bought within the field of medicin. There is also a correspondence between the education held in the participating municipality and which subject the purchased books belonged to. The libraries have all made rather similar purchases regarding subject, with the exception of Robertsfors. The most expensive subject was medicin, both per book and overall. The libraries have mostly bought their books on Internet bookstores due to their low cost and swift delivery. Purchasing on demand entails more benefits than inter-library lending, as it is less expensive, and a book, once bought, is available on the shelf for others to borrow it, although the increase of the library’s collection demands more thorough media-planning.

Purpose - The purpose of this research is to provide the scientific community with some quantitative data of relevance to the evaluation of two major citation databases. In addition, various aspects of the methodology of database coverage comparisons are discussed. Design/methodology/approach - Calculations of the overlaps between the journal lists of Web of Science and Scopus and some other major scientific databases are presented. Findings - The results provide some measures of the overall title coverage as well as the amount of unique material in the sources studied. Research limitations/implications - The journal title overlap calculations are based on journal lists provided by the database producers rather than searches in the databases themselves. Any inaccuracies in the lists may be reflected in the results. Also, the lists do not provide any information about the depth and consistency of the coverage. The nature of possible error sources is discussed. Originality/value - The methodology chosen allows comparatively quick comparisons between the contents of databases. This makes it suitable for analysis of trends in database coverage.

The aim of this bachelor thesis is to examine how hospital librarians experience their professional role, how they currently work with literature to promote health and well-being, as well as their thoughts and feelings about working with bibliotherapy in the future. The study is based on qualitative interviews with four hospital librarians who are working with literature to promote health and well-being, and that have thoughts about what bibliotherapy could mean as a working method. The results show that the occupational role of the hospital librarian is multifaceted and that there is a desire to locate what is at the heart of the profession. It also showed a wish for hospital libraries to have a clearer role in healthcare. Hospital librarians are now working on health promotion through literature improving happiness and strength among their visitors. A future bibliotherapeutic approach in hospital libraries could mean that they would have a more prominent role in health care.